How are extra costs resulting from the occurrence of unanticipated risks allocated in a procurement setting? This paper develops a theoretical framework combining transaction cost economics with equity theory in order to explain why parties endorse cooperative strategies, basically a 50-50...

Because of their perishable nature and the impact of their quality on consumers, agricultural products have always raised important problems of coordination and control with high transaction costs. The recent period in the agrifood industry has registered substantial evolution in devices...

This paper emphasizes the central role of arrangements called “hybrids” in the organization of production and distribution in market economies. Several forms are taken into account, such as subcontracting, supply-chain systems, distribution networks, franchising, partnerships, alliances, or...

In 1989 the government of Guinea enacted far-reaching reform of its water sector, which had been dominated by a poorly run public agency. The government signed a lease contract for operations and maintenance with a private operator, making a separate public enterprise responsible for ownershipof...

Compared with other urban water systems in West Africa, the water supply system in Abidjan performs very well. Documenting the recent history of that system, the authors try to answer three questions: What motivated reform in a system that was already performing well? How and why did the reform...

Both consumers and the government benefited from reform of the water system in Conakry, Guinea, whose deterioration since independence had become critical by the mid-1980s. Less than 40 percent of Conakry's population had access to piped water - low even by regional standards - and service was...

This paper deals with the organizational change in the provision of care for rare diseases, and the creation of a new structure: the centre of reference for rare diseases (CRMR). It aims to show that this new organization of care introduces a new authority within the healthcare organizational...

In several ways, the reform introduced to the water sector in Conakry, Guinea, in 1989 under a World Bank-led project was remarkable. It showed that even in a weak institutional environment, where contracts are hard to enforce and political interference is common, private sector participation...

Private sector participation in Guinea's urban water sector has benefited consumers, the government, and, to a lesser extent, the new foreign owners. Performance will improve further when the government starts paying its own water bill on time and when the legislature authorizes the collection...